This invention relates generally to the field of telecommunications equipment, and more specifically to the field of a multitasking graphical user interface for a telecommunications equipment that facilitates multiple communication related tasks to occur simultaneously while allowing a user to switch from task to task with ease.
Traditional communication systems, such as wireline telephones, cellular telephones, and personal digital assistants (PDAs), required a user to halt one communication-related task before proceeding to the next one. Although some of these communication systems offered limited multitasking by permitting voice communication concurrently with another communication related task, this operation prevented efficient multitasking by requiring that one of the communication related tasks be voice communication.
Another limitation of traditional cellular telephones that prevents efficient multitasking is the limited size of their displays and the use of text based and menu driven user interfaces. The inclusion of soft keys and scrolling lists have been insufficient to simplify user interaction to allow for efficient multitasking.
One conventional telephone uses menus to enable a user to interact with the system. Separate, distinct applications handle each type of communication task. For example, a fax application processes incoming and outgoing faxes, a Short Messaging Service (SMS) application handles incoming and outgoing short messages, and a telephone application handles incoming and outgoing voice calls. The telephone provides hard keys to enable the user to toggle between applications.
This type of telephone, however, suffers from a number of drawbacks. First, when a user presses one of the application hard keys, the corresponding application display completely overwrites the display, burying any opened application display. This technique does not allow the user to monitor the status of other opened applications, nor does it permit the user to see the interaction between applications.
Additionally, message handling is cumbersome because these telephones are menu driven and contain separate applications for different message types. To perform different types of communication tasks, the user must follow a series of menus that causes specific applications to be executed.
Therefore, a need exists to permit easy access to different communication tasks in a minimal number of steps while permitting the user to monitor the status of and toggle between communication tasks with ease.
Systems and methods consistent with the present invention address this need by providing a multitasking graphical user interface that gives a user quick access to all major communication tools so as to accomplish communication tasks in a minimal number of steps.
In accordance with the purpose of the invention as embodied and broadly described herein, the multitasking graphical user interface consistent with the principles of the present invention includes a telecommunications device that permits a user to perform several communication related tasks concurrently. The telecommunications device includes a user input device, a display having a tools portion and a windows portion, and a processing element. The processing element includes an element configured to represent the communication related tasks as objects in the tools portion, an element configured to launch different ones of the communication related tasks based upon selection of corresponding ones of the communication related task objects by the user via the user input device, and an element configured to change the window portion based on the user selection without changing the tools portion.